Millions of dollars of prototype Pokémon cards may have been fake, it’s claimed
Vintage Pokémon cards worth up to $55,000 may have been printed in 2024
Millions of dollars’ worth of Pokémon cards, which were claimed to have been printed prior to the creation of the Pokémon Trading Card Game (TCG) itself, may have been faked, it’s been claimed.
Prior to the introduction of the Pokémon TCG, prototype cards were made in order to test the game mechanics. Naturally, these cards are incredibly rare, with copies of them largely being lost to time, or hidden in private collections.
In 2024, hundreds of these cards appeared on auction sites, with most of these cards coming from the personal collection of Takumi Akabane, one of the six main creators of the Pokémon TCG. Pokémon card grading company CGC worked with Akabane to ‘verify’ these prototype cards.
Following the verification from CGC, some of these cards sold for as much as $55,000 at auction, due to their rarity and condition.
Now it appears that some of these cards, including those from Akabane’s collection, may have in fact been printed last year.
In a post to the Elite Fourum, a user called PRF who bought some of these prototype cards has alleged that they are in fact replicas that were printed on a commercial printer in June 2024.
This has been discovered due to the fact that modern printers leave metadata on everything they print via extremely faint patterns. These patterns can be seen in high-resolution scans, or under certain lighting conditions.
In a statement to Pokébeach, PRF said: “It was really disheartening to find this out. More than the financial aspect, I thought it was cool to own a piece of history and it’s unfortunate it turned out this way.”
Alt Auction House, one of the auction houses selling these cards, said: “We’re aware of recent claims regarding CGC-graded Pokémon Prototype and Playtest cards that have been sold across various platforms. CGC has assured us they are taking these allegations seriously and are conducting a thorough review.
“We’re staying in close communication with CGC and will share updates as they become available.”
